Mark Mahoney & M. Peck-STARFEST 2007

"Created to honor the 50th anniversary of the Sputnik launch, synthesists Mark Mahoney and M. Peck make us believe space is truly the place on Starfest 2007, recorded live in front of what must have been a spellbound audience. Taking their cues from the usual 70s Teutonic suspects, the duo tweak the model just enough to bring some much-needed vitality to an often tired genre. “Initial Launch” begins as you might expect, with requisite radio broadcasts pinging everything’s a go, but once the sequencers begin chugging away both artists let loose with a barrage of astringent effects. “Entering A Foreign Atmosphere” simultaneously becalms, bedazzles and bewilders, twinkling synth stardust across frozen tundra, all wrapped up in a twisting corkscrew of oscillating pitches and forlorn mellotron. “Alien Shore and Unworldly Outpost” might take electronic music’s vocabulary a bit literally (the ambiguity of science fiction imagery is too critical to its audio analog), but Mssrs. Mahoney and Peck are synth wizards of a high order, reaching deep into the looking-glass to extract a fusillade of sonic lifeforms that tickle our respective fancies—coolness. "
-Darren Bergstein e/i Magazine > AUDIO VERITÉ December 19, 2008
http://www.eiaudioverite.blogspot.com/


"Mahoney & Peck use the live environment to further their music. Existing in the moment, their pieces seem to come into being equally out of hours of conception and preparation as much as from the happy accidents that plague and please such performers. Their CD Starfest 2007 (49'43") features six concert tracks that show this duo to be traveling on the same beam and sharing the same vision. Playing all manner of synthesizers, Mahoney & Peck realize a unique and optimistic style of electronic music. Based on ideas relating to tone and mood they achieve an electronic sound that is remarkable - both in its approach and in the way it is perceived at the listening stage. Spontaneous modulations and weird changes in direction provide a sense of excitement while the more recent addition of synthetic percussion and bouncy sequencer riffs propel tracks forward at a fast clip. Full-throated bold melodies run above shifting synthesizer pads while samples of ancient satellite telemetry mingles with spacey effects and reedy drones. This album touches on many styles of Spacemusic (a byproduct of this duo's multitude of influences) and leads the listener through glowing clouds of digital ambiance, to the darkness of space, and finally to float among the twinkling stars of a strange celestial road."
- Chuck van Zyl/STAR'S END 12 September 2008

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